


Roll of the Dice

by Clocketpatch



Category: Jumanji (1995)
Genre: Christmas, F/M, Parent-Child Relationship, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-24
Updated: 2016-12-24
Packaged: 2018-09-11 19:46:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,396
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9008572
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Clocketpatch/pseuds/Clocketpatch
Summary: The exciting consequences of the game will continue after you reach the finish and call out its name.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [gaialux](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gaialux/gifts).



> Thank you for this prompt! I had a lot of fun revisiting a favourite childhood movie as a result. This is based entirely on the movie since I've never seen the cartoon. Happy Yuletide, I hope you enjoy!

 

“Just roll, Dad,” Angie said. “It’s not hard. You’re the elephant.”

“I know I’m the elephant. I’m always the elephant. Angie, I don’t want to play this game.”

“Don’t be scared, Dad, just roll.”

Angie watched him from the other side of the coffee table. She was twenty-two and didn’t live at home anymore. It was odd for her to be there. Something was off about the entire situation. It was the game’s fault. It had to be. The game distorted things. It made the unreal, real, and changed time so that things that were real never got a chance to happen, or happened differently.

The game sat on the coffee table between them. Alan tried to look away from it, but it kept drawing his eye. It was as he remembered.

The dark wood. The earthy smell. The blood red lettering ( _Adventurer BEWARE)_. The sound of drums –

The dice sat heavy in his hand. Alan remembered telling his daughter stories of Jumanji when she was a little girl. He wasn’t certain why he’d done it. He’d spent decades trying not to think about the jungle, but, somehow, turning it into a story had made the game seem less threatening. It had happened, and it had been terrible, but now it was nothing but a bedtime story.

Then Angie tried to recreate Jumanji out of cardboard and asked him to play.

“Maybe later,” he’d lied, trying to ignore the way she pouted out her lip with disappointment. The genetic combination of Sarah’s gold spun hair and his sky-blue Parrish eyes made Angie look like a story book angel. She’d believed him. Of course, she had, he was a good father and he’d never lied to her about anything.

That night Alan told her about _The Three Little Pigs_. She wanted a jungle story, but he refused, he would never tell her about Jumanji again. After she was asleep, Alan snuck down the stairs fed her creation to the fireplace. The flames quickly devoured the glued and painted bits of cereal box and egg carton. There were no drums. Angie’s seven-year-old attempt at capturing the magic of his stories had no actual power. He knew that.

But how could he take the chance?

“Roll the dice. Now.”

Her voice brought him back to the distorted present. Angie watched him from across the coffee table. The game sat between them. Where had she found it? Why had she brought it to him?

Alan’s hands shook. He gripped the dice tightly to prevent an accidental fall. He could hear the crackle of flames on cardboard even though the fireplace wasn’t lit. The room was suffused with humid, jungle heat.

“ _Dad_.” She was so expectant. Angie wanted him to right that childhood wrong (but how did she even know what he had done? Sarah knew, and had agreed with Alan’s decision. They’d both blamed the lost game on the dog.)

“I _can’t_ ,” he whispered. He’d tried so hard to be a good father, to be normal, to be loving and kind and firm and competent and – it was so hard to be a parent, even without the weight of the jungle. It wasn’t just the burnt replica of Jumanji; it was his dislike of the zoo, the way he wouldn’t always notice if food had gone off, his inability to play any game involving dice without spiralling into a panic attack...

“It’s okay.” She held out her hand towards him. “I understand. You’re only trying to protect me. I know you love me.”

Alan slowly uncurled his fingers and tipped his palm to give Angie the dice. The sound of ivory clattering against wood when Angie snatched back her hand thudded against Alan’s soul. He remembered playing the same trick on Sarah.

“It’s the law of the jungle,” Angie said, smirking. Her face deformed, widened, aged. Alan staggered backwards, tripping over the couch as his daughter morphed into Van Pelt. Alan knew what was wrong now. This was all a dream. A night terror. Nothing to be afraid of.

The hunter levelled his rifle.

“In the jungle, you must wait,” Van Pelt recited, tightening his finger on the trigger.

“No.” Alan closed his eyes and covered his ears. He whispered to himself, “Wake up, wake up, wake up…”

He could feel his body evaporating and stretching out. It didn’t hurt, but the loss of control was terrifying. Alan knew what came next, and there was nothing he could do to stop it.

The gun fired.

Alan reconstituted on the jungle floor in a loamy clearing. He was twelve years old again and completely alone. Eyes peered at him from the surrounding trees. Hoots and growls echoed across the treetops. The sky was swirling darkness. The words of his sentence were written across the clouds in lurid, swirling green:

_In the jungle, you must wait. Until the dice read five, or eight._

Alan knew those words would remain there, taunting him, every night, for the rest of his life.

-

Alan woke up, tangled in damp sheets, breathing heavily. His heart thudded against his ribs. He could hear the furnace banging through the vents, and he knew that it was harmless, but the adrenaline rushing threw his body registered it as a threat. A strange noise in the night meant you should run, hide, hold your breath, pray.

He felt something gripping him around the chest (A constricting snake? A carnivorous plant? One of Van Pelt’s traps?). No. Settle. Steady. Steady. Alan patted down his surrounding and identified Sarah’s arms, his wife’s arms, giving him a reassuring squeeze. Alan took deep breaths. Gradually his heartrate settled.

He was in his bedroom. According to the alarm clock it was 4:58 AM. He was nearly sixty years old. Outside, Brantford was covered in a cheery blanket of snow (it never snowed in the jungle). Beside him, Sarah was asleep. She was so used to his night terrors, after all these years, that she could comfort him without waking.

If Alan listened hard, he could hear Angie’s soft snores drifting from across the hall. It was winter break and she was safely asleep in her old bedroom. There were no dice or board games in the house. Jumanji was at the bottom of the ocean and unable to exert its power over any of them. Everything was fine.

Alan lay in the dark, staring at the ceiling, listening to the furnace, and then, later, to an early-morning snow plough. Everything was fine.

At 7:03 AM, he got out of bed and padded down the hall to the bathroom where he enjoyed the modern luxuries of indoor plumbing, hot water, and ultra-plush toilet paper. Everything was fine.

 At 8:32 AM he descended the stairs to a kitchen that had never been full of monkeys. Angie sat at the breakfast table, sipping coffee, and watching videos on an improbably thin tablet. Sarah stood by the counter, mixing pancake batter. Alan ambled over to stand behind her.

“Good morning,” he whispered into the crook of her neck. “I love you.”

“Did you use all of the hot water?”

He didn’t answer. He didn’t have to. She knew and understood everything already.

Sarah turned her head to give him a kiss. Alan smelled her hair. Clean and soft, even if it was more silver than gold these days. He blinked hard and hugged her until she playfully fended him off with the batter spoon.

Alan put a vanilla decaf pod in the Keurig. The result smelled slightly artificial, but satisfying.

He sat next to his daughter and sipped his coffee. It was Christmas morning. He was surrounded by the people he loved. In a few hours, Peter and his husband would come over to help Sarah make dinner (always an all-day affair). There would be presents. They would Skype with Judy and her family in New Caledonia (last year it had been Guyana, the year before that, Iceland).

Life wasn’t always easy or clear-cut. Alan’s greatest fear was that, one day, somehow, Angie would be sucked into the horrors of Jumanji. He hated the game and everything it had taken from him.

At the same time, as he enjoyed his morning coffee and the company of the two most important women in his life, Alan was profoundly thankful for everything it had given him in return.    


End file.
